I'm fascinated by entrepreneurs, which is why I've spent almost twenty years writing about them and their businesses, across all sectors; how they innovate, problem solve, disrupt, and drive growth, among many other things.
When I'm not covering the business start up scene, I'm writing about business management, talent, social enterprise, business education, finance, franchising for the British national press, including The Guardian and The Times, and leading business and finance journals and periodicals such as Director, Economia and Edge, as well as their online media channels.
I'm also an accomplished ghost writer - Pure Dynamite - The Autobiography of the Dynamite Kid, was a journalistic diversion that tested those skills to the limit; a ghost blogger for a number of British corporate entities, and a guest blogger for Richard Branson's Virgin Entrepreneur channel.
In my pre-journalism days I worked as a biomedical scientist in a hospital pathology department, where I learned to be observant, inquisitive, tenacious and a stickler for detail; qualities that subsequently stood me in good stead as a business journalist.

How Disruptive Business Partners Disrupt In Harmony

There is something of a rock star status attached to being a ‘disruptive’ start-up founder.

With the start-up sector spawning pre-pubescent millionaires and boy-next-door billionaires, being the top dog behind the company name and logo can feel like a very big deal.

A relentless pursuit of success mixed with large doses of adrenalin and anxiety can create a pretty heady cocktail for new entrepreneurs, so what happens when two of them team up to start a business? How do they keep their disruptive streaks from derailing their business plans?

When entrepreneurs Lee Biggins and Brian Wakem teamed up to launch online recruitment CV-Library currently one of the UK’s largest independent job boards, their contrasting styles could have resulted in a very different outcome for the business.

Biggins had shown entrepreneurial flair at the age of 11, when he launched a successful car washing business, while Wakem had shown technical prowess as an early adopter of web development technology, building a website dedicated to the maintenance and tuning of his favourite car, a RenaultRenault.

Harmonious disruption

Whilst they never came to blows, early on they had disagreements on some key issues, such as the look of their website.

Biggins recalls: “Brian wanted to use the colours and elements of his Renault website for CV-Library, which we didn’t agree on; Brian wasn’t as strong at design as he was at development! However we didn’t have too many arguments over the 12 years we were together, the reason being that we completely respected each other’s skills and strengths.”

Wakem agrees. “Lee wasn’t keen on some of my design ideas if I recall, and I remember thinking that Lee’s ideas for marketing the brand were not always ‘traditional’, but we were able to discuss these challenges and move forward, knowing that time spent sweating the small stuff meant progress on more important projects was being hampered,” he says.

Their biggest challenge was creating a point of differentiation for CV-Library, so their early efforts were focused on transforming the brand from just a CV Database to a fully-fledged job board. The economic recession was also a massive challenge, and cutting customer support staff, as other job boards had done, was not a solution for a business that wanted to compete on service.

“Because of the speed at which CV-Library grew, we tended to agree on all business strategies and growth plans. It wasn’t broken, even in the toughest times, so there was no need to rock the boat and try and fix it, says Biggins.

The key to a smooth start-up, says Wakem, is to agree a solid plan at the outset and stick to it as far as possible.

“That way any potential conflicts can be overcome by referring back to the plan and discussing why the plan might need to be altered in some way. Having a different skillset from your partner helps, as you will both learn to respect each other’s skills and strengths,” he says.

To Have And To Hold…And To Disrupt

The situation gets even trickier when the disruptive business partners also happen to be married, as in the case of dentists David and Rashmi Hickey, whose approach to marketing their private dental practice Southport Road Dental has shaken up perceptions of what has always been a very traditional profession in the UK.

Their unconventional strategy has helped them double practice turnover in just four years, but both partners had to rock the boat to get there.

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